"There is no medicine like hope," once wrote Orison Marden, that most-American of authors. "[There is] no tonic so powerful as expectation of something tomorrow."

For Dodgers fans, tomorrow's tonic seems a long way off right now. How long can this TV blackout linger? In San Diego, a similar situation lasted two years. In the case of the hapless Padres, that might be considered a civic courtesy. But still.

Even more remarkable about the Padres' situation is that Time Warner Cable, the overlord in the Dodgers standoff, was on the other side of the equation. Down there, Fox Sports San Diego had the rights to the games, and TWC balked at the asking price. So an estimated 185,000 households — 22% of the market — went two years without TV coverage, until it was resolved for this season.